Wareham runs C-C out of tournament

Sean Lewis, Staff Writer

Saturday

Feb 28, 2009 at 12:01 AMFeb 28, 2009 at 1:01 PM

The Wareham boys’ basketball team scored over 100 points in a victory over Middleboro on Wednesday, but that wasn’t its best game of the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association Division III South Sectional tournament.

The Wareham boys’ basketball team scored over 100 points in a victory over Middleboro on Wednesday, but that wasn’t its best game of the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association Division III South Sectional tournament.

No, the top-seeded Vikings saved that honor for No. 8 Coyle-Cassidy, as Wareham dominated the Warriors, 82-43, in its home gym — sending C-C home for the season in dramatic fashion.

“I was obviously very pleased,” Wareham head coach Kevin Brogioli said. “We have a lot of respect for Coyle, especially the way they played last game. And our game plan is to run, and when we run we think we’re hard to beat. We proved it tonight I guess.”

With talented athletes at every position, the Vikings (22-1) ran wild in transition and rarely allowed the Warriors’ defense to get set during the first three quarters when the starters were still playing.

“Best game we’ve played all year,” Tavares said. “The most complete game, all defense — 100 percent on defense, 100 percent on offense. We just had an all-around good game. The second half we came out stronger than ever. There was intensity and just fast-break, fast-break, fast-break.”

The Warriors (16-6) struggled out of the gate, as Wareham opened up a 17-2 lead to start the game. C-C was able to respond a little and end the quarter at 17-7.

But the Vikings were just getting warmed up, as the pace of the game increased in the second quarter and Wareham’s starters pushed the lead to 42-18 at the break, essentially ending the contest.

“I don’t know if there’s ever a great feeling when you loose and that’s kind of what I told the guys here,” C-C head coach Mike Watson said. “They played well, we did not play well. We did not come out of the box and score a lot of points. Our effort was there, but we couldn’t get the ball to go in the basket. We kind of built a bit of a deficit early on. It wasn’t meant to be.”

Leazott, one of C-C’s three senior captains, was the lone Warrior to have a major impact on the game, as he tied Rezendes for game-high honors with 18 points.

The only other Warrior to come close to double digits in scoring was reserve sharpshooter Michael Brennan, who scored nine points in the final eight minutes.

“At the beginning I felt like we were playing with them and we were staying with them,” Leazott said. “Obviously they were going to have a little bit of a lead and they were going to go on runs and score a lot of points, but I felt like at the beginning we stayed with them, but they started to pull away.”

Afterward, Leazott said that the Vikings were the likely favorites to claim the Division III crown (Wareham was knocked out by state champ Scituate last year, and will face Scituate again in the semifinals).

“Honestly, I’ve never played Wareham before, so that’s a great way for us to go out like that,” said Leazott about the final game of his high school career. “I like to play the best team on our last game, and that’s what we did. It just didn’t work out the way we wanted it to.”

The loss was a bitter one for C-C’s two other senior captains. Mike Muller was held scoreless, although he was able to grab five rebounds and block three shots. Conor Henry had two steals and two points, but fouled out in the third quarter.

The game was also the final contest for Vincent Mastria, Paul Donlon, Nate Perkins and Brennan.

“These kids have done more for the Coyle basketball program than I could possibly describe in words,” Watson said. “Their effort every single day in practice, they won 31 games in two years. That’s a terrific accomplishment. I couldn’t tell you the last time when it happened, but they’ve done it because they showed up, they’ve been committed to the program, committed to the team, committed to what we’re trying to do and we’ve been able to put two great years together.”

slewis@tauntongazette.com

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